


Close Encounters Part Nine (final)

by JaneDavitt



Series: Close Encounters [9]
Category: Psych
Genre: Angst, Arguing, M/M, Spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-28
Updated: 2010-09-28
Packaged: 2017-10-12 06:53:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/122100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaneDavitt/pseuds/JaneDavitt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Final part of the story. Carlton and Shawn make some discoveries about each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Close Encounters Part Nine (final)

Carlton opened his eyes to a dark room, but the door was cracked wide enough to allow in some light from the hallway. He frowned, listening to the muted murmur of the TV in the living room. It didn't tell him if Shawn was still around or not. Shawn was more than capable of walking out leaving the plug in a bath and the water running.

He got out of bed, naked but no longer damp, and put on a pair of shorts and a robe. The clock by the bed was insisting that it was midnight so there didn't seem like much point in getting fully dressed, not when he'd spent the last few hours sprawled out for Spencer to ogle at will. The thought of that made his skin feel itchy and warm.

Shawn was on the couch, wearing shorts and a white T-shirt, eating popcorn and watching some mindless pap on the television. Carlton sat down beside him with a grunt that meant 'move over' and scooped up a handful of popcorn.

Sleep was still with him, a fog of it graying out his vision and making him want to tilt his head to the side and rest it on Shawn's shoulder. He yawned widely and took some more popcorn instead.

The silence between them stretched out like chewed gum but Carlton didn't feel the need to speak. Shawn had stuck around after what passed for an apology. Right then, it was enough to buy him some measure of forgiveness. Ground had been lost, but not much. Trusting Shawn had never come easily, so Carlton was willing to slip back into watchful waiting again.

They finished the bowl down to the last un-popped kernels, left to roll around with a dusting of crumbs for company, and Shawn set the bowl on the floor.

"I didn't know if you were going to wake up."

"Do I look like Sleeping Beauty?" Carlton inquired. "Don't answer that."

"Happy to be Prince Charming and wake you with a kiss," Shawn said. "Close your eyes again."

Carlton almost fell into the trap of obeying him, but if this was going to work -- and he'd been unhappy enough when he'd thought that it wasn't to know that he wanted it to -- then he had to at least try to fight back. Shawn controlled situations, always, sometimes obviously, blatantly, sometimes with a subtle touch that verged on Machiavellian. He needed to be taught that it couldn't always be like that.

Without thinking past the desire to kiss Spencer's salted, butter-slick lips, Carlton turned, moved, and let his weight bear down on a startled Shawn. Pinned under him on the couch, Shawn was all wide eyes and fake startled splutters, but Carlton ignored him. He settled himself comfortably, cupped Shawn's jaw in his hand to hold him still, and kissed him.

Shawn didn't stop talking for an endless five seconds or so but his hands were sliding over Carlton's shoulders before Carlton's mouth had even touched his. Shawn wanted this. Carlton wasn't sure he'd ever get used to that, but he wasn't sure that he wanted to, so that was okay.

"You taste good," he said, kissing his way down Shawn's throat.

"Lassie, you have no idea how much better I'll taste when you cover me with whipped cream and make me into a sundae that you slurp up with a straw."

That made about as much sense as anything Shawn said -- in other words, very little -- but Carlton was learning how to interpret. Maybe not up to Guster's standards of fluency -- no one ever would with the head start Guster had -- but he was learning. Straws and cream meant…Shawn wanted a blow job? Probably so that he could pick up some tips as much as for the pleasure of the act itself. Shawn had to hate being the newbie. Carlton had no problems at all with that. He couldn't think of an easier way to reduce Shawn's assurance to a whisper and dial up the volume on the begging for more.

Carlton really wanted to hear Shawn beg. It didn't have to be fancy, Shawn's verbal equivalent of a steamy tango. "Please, pretty please, Lassie, God, yes, _please_ …" would do nicely, but Carlton just wanted to hear a 'please' and a 'thank you' afterward wouldn't come amiss either.

He toyed with the idea of insisting that Shawn write a bread and butter letter after sex just for the hell of it then realized he'd lost his mind. Lack of sleep and emotional turmoil did that to a man.

So. A simple blow job to seal the truce. On the other hand, there was a can of whipped cream in the fridge and a jar of cherries around somewhere. Carlton's young nephew Peter liked to drop them into his ginger ale on the rare times that he visited and pretend that he was drinking a cocktail. Carlton had his own opinions on that kind of behavior, but he kept his mouth shut. His sister didn't take helpful criticism any better than the normal kind.

The cuffs Shawn had taken off -- something that still made Carlton want to grind his teeth even after a restorative few hours sleep -- were on the coffee table. Carlton reached out and grabbed them, then dangled them by one finger in front of Shawn. "You want to wear these when I blow you?"

He felt the heat rush through Shawn as his words sank in. That Shawn liked the idea wasn't in doubt, but Carlton needed to hear him say it. Flushed cheeks, dazed, glazed eyes and a confused, cute pout just weren't enough. The jab of Shawn's erection wasn't either.

"Use your words, Shawn," he said with a sardonic grin he didn't keep private.

"Yeah," Shawn said on a long exhale. He shook himself like a wet dog and achieved a visible measure of composure that Carlton bet was skin-deep if that. "Sounds good, Officer Lassie. Bring on the bondage."

Carlton stood and moved the coffee table aside, then pointed at the rug. "Down here."

"Huh?"

"I need to cuff you _to_ something," Carlton explained, making sure that he had a nicely impatient frown on his face. "I haven't got all night, Spencer."

Slowly, sneaking glances at Carlton as if he expected to be told that it was a joke, Shawn slid off the couch and onto the floor, landing on his ass. Carlton stayed on his feet, staring down at Shawn and making the most of his height. He waited for Shawn to protest or even get up again, but Shawn, after a silent moment, shrugged and extended his hands up to him. "Do it."

"Lie down," Carlton said getting out of his way. "Hands over your head."

"God, you're really getting into this," Shawn said with a grin. "Dom Lassie. Do you come with a matching whip and a choice of leather boots? Because if you do, I know what I'm asking Santa for when he tells me I've been a bad boy."

It didn't sound like a complaint, but Carlton answered it as if it were one. "This was your idea. I'm going to teach you to be more careful about what you ask me for."

"You don't always have to give it to me." Shawn lay back, wriggling into place, arms over his head, positioning himself so that the cuffs could be looped around the leg of the couch. Initiative. That was good to see.

Carlton crouched down beside Shawn and ran a finger across the inside of his right wrist. The cuffs were heavy in his hand but even without them on, Shawn didn't move. Carlton liked Shawn's obedience, temporary though it probably was, but he wanted to make it impossible for Shawn to move. He wanted to hold the only key. With a flash of honesty, he admitted to himself that he really wanted to hear Shawn beg. "No, but usually I want to if I'm…with someone. It's part of my job."

"Not just with me?" Shawn asked with the suggestion of a pout. "And it's not supposed to be hard work, you know. Fun. It comes just before 'Funyuns' in the dictionary."

Carlton shook his head. "I tried with Victoria," he said. "I always try. It just doesn't always work out the way I want it to."

He hated that. He succeeded. It was what he did. When he didn't, when his best efforts were flung back at him…

Shawn sat up and Carlton was startled out of what he had to admit was a brooding silence by a kiss, messy, hot, and hard.

"Stop thinking," Shawn said, the earnestness in his green eyes as new to Carlton as the kissing. Spencer. Kissing him without smirking afterward or hesitating before. It had been a strange few days. "The scowling's hot, but it's giving you frown lines and I'm guessing you won't take my advice and get a facial any time soon."

"You've got that right," Carlton told him. He ran his tongue over his lips, tasting Shawn. "I was going to tie you down, strip you, and cover your dick with cream," he said. It wasn't a confession. More of a warning. Except now that he'd said it aloud, it sounded stupid.

"Pouring cream or the sort you squirt out of a can?" Shawn asked, sounding interested in the answer.

"Can."

Shawn considered that for a moment and then shrugged. "Sure. Go for it. Watch out for hairs though. There's always one or two loose ones down there."

"And now I'm crossing that off the list of things I want to do," Carlton said pulling a face. "Thanks for spoiling the fantasy."

"You wouldn't have done it," Shawn said with an annoying assurance. "Too messy. Too silly. Too much cholesterol. No, wait, you're the man who takes coffee with his cream and sugar, not the other way around. Cancel that last bit."

"I guess I'm just not the adventurous kind of man you're used to," Carlton said sarcastically. "Oh, wait, I'm the _only_ \--"

"You get off on handcuffing me, so I wouldn't say that," Shawn interrupted him to say, settling with his back against the couch and looking as comfortable on the floor as he had on Carlton's bed. "You've got kinky depths. Who doesn't?"

"So tell me one of your kinks," Carlton said. He propped his elbow on the couch cushion and rested his chin on his hand. "Something real," he added when Shawn's mouth popped open immediately, ready to spill some bullshit bit of esoteric erotica. That closed Shawn's mouth, but not for long.

"Spanking," Shawn said. "A girlfriend spanked me once and it was…well, it was a disaster, but it felt like it should've been really, really hot and I keep remembering it how it should have been and ooh…"

His eyes closed and he writhed, the effect sensual enough to dry Carlton's mouth. "Spanking isn't sexy," he managed to say. "Believe me, it isn't."

Shawn opened his eyes and stopped squirming. "That sounded heartfelt. Dish the dirt."

Carlton shrugged one shoulder. "No dirt. Just a few nuns with rulers. Sorry to disappoint you, but those ladies weren't anything I want near my sex life."

"They came at you with _rulers_?" Shawn said, his eyes wide. "Jesus."

Carlton smiled grimly. "Yes, they mentioned him a few times when they were turning the palms of my hand red."

The humiliation had been worse than the pain. The rest of the class snickering behind their hands, no sympathy evident, the ritual 'Thank you, Sister Maria' at the end, choked out of a tear-tight throat, the way his palm felt stiff and hot and shiny for hours, no matter how often he ran cold water over it or pressed it against the cool wood of his desk.

"So I'm guessing…"

"Not up there on my to-do list."

"It's still on mine," Shawn said. "Nameless girlfriend I won't name did it all wrong. She giggled and she tapped at my ass, then she giggled some more."

Carlton's attention sharpened. Shawn sounded pissed off and frustrated, his mouth tight, his fingers drumming against his thigh.

"It was like a place on me was itching and I wanted her to scratch it, hard, and she was tickling it with a feather instead," Shawn continued, and look who was brooding now. " _You_ wouldn't do it like that."

" _I_ wouldn't do it at --"

"You'd commit to it," Shawn went on, ignoring Carlton completely, his voice low, intense, utterly focused. "If you thought I needed it to calm down, chill out, drive me insane with lust, whatever, you'd just grab me, no fuss, no talking, and put me across your knee, hold me down with one hand, take down my pants with the other, and then _wham_ \--"

"Jesus, Shawn." Carlton put out his hand and covered Shawn's mouth before it could say anything else. He felt Shawn's lips move, shaping a few more words, but he didn't try to decipher them. "I'll do it. You won't like it as much as you think, but I'll do it. Just not now."

Shawn turned his head and Carlton let his hand fall away. "Why not now?"

That was so very Shawn. He was as willing to wait for what he wanted as a toddler offered ice cream. "Because…because I'm still not sure I'm over what you did yesterday."

An expression Carlton couldn't pin down flashed over Shawn's face, but he answered lightly. "So? You're angry. Perfect time."

"Wrong time," Carlton said tersely. "If I ever do it -- yeah, okay, fine, I said I would, I will -- _when_ I do it, you'll know I'm in a good mood and you're not on my shit-list. That's not going to happen tonight after that stunt you pulled with the key."

"But you were going to do something to me," Shawn said and all his attention was on Carlton now, which was unnerving. "With the cream and the cuffs."

"I told you. I was going to blow you," Carlton said and marveled again at how surreal this all was. Maybe he was hallucinating the whole thing. Spencer had probably slipped something into his coffee and he was on a wild trip over the rainbow. That made more sense than a world in which he was telling Shawn Spencer that he'd been a squirt away from sucking his dick. "That's all."

"So even when you're pissed at me, I get a blow job?" Shawn whistled. "Okay, having you for a boyfriend comes with some serious perks, Lassie."

"The moment's passed," Carlton said, fighting the urge to correct 'boyfriend' though he was damned if he knew what word fit better. "I don't want to do anything to you right now."

"Lassie's lying," Shawn sing-songed. "How can we tell, boys and girls? He turned down awesomely hot sex with me."

"I'm not in the mood to give you another tutorial," Carlton said with a brutal frankness he didn't regret even a little. "There's an art to getting blow jobs. You'd probably choke me to death and not notice."

"Hate to burst your bubble, Professor, but I've been on the receiving end plenty of times and never gotten complaints."

Oh. Right. Carlton had been so focused on Shawn's inexperience with men that he'd forgotten the many women who'd fallen into Shawn's bed and probably rolled out of it soon after. He'd _wanted_ to forget them.

He shrugged, covering his mistake with a glare. "Fine, so you wouldn't ram your dick down my throat. Good to know. It doesn't mean that I want to --"

"Then stop talking about it," Shawn said, as close to annoyed as Carlton had ever seen him. He knelt up, one hand on the couch, and stabbed at Carlton's chest with his finger. "You come in here, wave those cuffs at me, get me to tell you about something I want, then tell me you won't do it, say you were going to blow me and back off --"

"If you don't like it -"

"Like it? _Like_ it?" Shawn shoved his fingers through his hair, leaving it sticking up. Carlton couldn't help sneaking a glance down. It wasn't the only part of Shawn standing tall. "Lassie, I'm sexually frustrated. Ask Gus what I'm like when I get this way."

"I'd rather shoot myself."

"I get manic." Shawn stood and Carlton automatically rose with him. Shawn's eyes were narrowed and his teeth looked sharper than usual. His hands sliced at the air, broad gestures, wildly exaggerated. "I get impulsive. I watch marathons of shows I know aren't good for me and I eat candy until my teeth stick together and I lose the ability to tell if a jelly bean is lime or apple."

"Me, I just jerk off," Carlton said and watched Shawn pause mid-diatribe, his mouth hanging open. "A lot since I met you," he added.

Shawn visibly preened. "You jerked off? Over me?"

"Not literally," Carlton said with an attempt at humor.

"You could," Shawn offered with commendable generosity or desperation, Carlton wasn't sure which. "That could be kinda hot."

Carlton visualized Shawn tied to his bed, his tanned skin splattered with trails of white; across his rigid cock, drops of spunk decorating it from balls to tip, or coating his face, pure porn, that last image, with Shawn's tongue flicking across his lips to taste what he'd been given. He shuddered. "You put ideas into my head. Strange, off-putting ideas."

"I know," Shawn said with a fond, proud smile. "I just wish you'd let some of them out to play for the day, Lassie."

Carlton sighed and massaged his forehead with the tips of his fingers. "You're hard work, you know that? You're a roller coaster ride. A tornado. A plague."

"Hmm. Interesting range of options there and one that says more about you than me, but I'm resisting the temptation to analyze when I could be doing other things that start with the same four letters."

It took Carlton long enough to work that out and roll his eyes that Shawn had time to move closer. Shawn pressed up against him like a licked stamp on an envelope was distracting. When he had a hard-on, and he very definitely did, distraction turned to temptation without breaking a sweat.

"I'm right here," Shawn said, enunciating the words carefully. "I'm ready and raring to go and I'm not going to take 'I'm tired, let's just cuddle' as an acceptable substitute for 'Ass up and get ready to scream, Shawn, I'm going in.' If you don't want me, I'll go home, but -- okay, that last bit was a lie. I'm not going anywhere."

"Shawn --"

"Aaaand I'm moving to pitiful face," Shawn interrupted him to say. "I can get Gus weeping with this one and he's had years to get used to it. You'd be toast. Soggy toast. I'm going to count to three and then the lip-quivering will commence. One…two…"

"Don't," Carlton said and held up his hand to forestall whatever tactic Shawn was about to unleash. "I'm going back to bed. You can…you can join me if you want. To sleep. Nothing else."

"I'm not tired," Shawn said and managed to sound like a six-year-old avoiding naptime. It wasn't without its appeal, but on a whole different level than Shawn probably intended.

"Well, I am. I didn't get much sleep last night after that little trick you pulled and --"

"Fuck you," Shawn said evenly, his voice chilled to the point where Carlton expected to see icicles forming on Shawn's lips.

"What?"

"That's the second, maybe third time you've brought that up. You're just like Henry," Shawn continued.

"I am _nothing_ like --"

"You expect me to be perfect and when I'm not, when I maybe get just a little concerned about what's _expected_ of me and take a break to think it over --"

"A break? You walked out on me --"

"You get bent out of shape, like I let you down, like I _failed_ you and you never let it go, never, no matter how much I try to make it up to you, how many times I do it over and over and get it right, you just focus on the one time I blew it."

The ice was melting now, but the raw hot fury replacing it wasn't an improvement. Carlton didn't step back from the threat Shawn posed, never had, never would with anyone, but he did spare a moment to wonder how they'd gotten from point A to B and another to wish that he had Henry Spencer in his interrogation room for an hour. The man cared about his son, anyone could see that, but mixed in with the love was one hell of a lot of resentment, and it wasn't news to Carlton that what went for the senior Spencer also held true for the junior.

"Stop it, Shawn. Just calm down and we can talk --" He put his hand on Spencer's shoulder, the muscles there taut and quivering.

He was clearly in a hell where he never got to complete his sentences, but this time Shawn chose a different way to interrupt him.

Carlton didn't have any choice about stepping back. The fist in his mouth forced him to, making him stagger, and he was lucky to stay on his feet.

"I'm leaving," Shawn said, breathing fast and shallow. "I'm done here."

"You even try to walk out of that door and I'll arrest you for assaulting a police officer," Carlton snapped. "Then you can leave in cuffs and we can take a nice trip to the station. That what you want, Spencer?"

Shawn brought the hand he'd hit Carlton with up to his mouth, wiping it across lips that were trembling. He looked lost, as dazed as if he'd been the one sucker-punched. Carlton licked at his lip, stinging, wet with blood, and sighed. "Fine. If you want to go, I won't stop you, but for what it's worth, I'm sorry."

"What for?" Shawn said, his voice muted now, the violence drained out of him. "I'm the one who hit you."

"Yeah, you did. Because of a bunch of issues I could care less about, and for the record, you hit like a girl."

"I dare you to say that in front of Jules. She hits like a girl, too."

"She hits like a cop," Carlton corrected him. "I'm not your goddamned therapist, Shawn, and I'm not standing in for your dad, either. One, we're nothing like, beyond the cops who like to fish deal, and two, that's beyond kinky and into sick and I don't like that. It makes me uncomfortable."

"But spanking me doesn't?"

"Is that something Henry did?" Carlton asked, a cold shiver wriggling down his back.

Shawn shrugged. "Mostly he was a big fan of the punishment fitting the crime. Amazingly, often yard work or washing his car was the perfect match."

Carlton couldn't help smiling. "Sounds like he'd get on with my mother -- no, forget that. He wouldn't. No one does."

Shawn eyed him doubtfully. "I should go. I don't mean forever if you're not ready to call it quits, just for tonight."

"Forget about it," Carlton told him. Like it mattered what he wanted. Shawn had shown him today that if he was still interested, he'd just keep on coming after Carlton no matter how much Carlton shoved him away. "If you disappear on me now, the next time I see you, we'll be back to pretending these last two days never happened and I don't want that."

"You should," Shawn said. "I'm hard work."

Carlton grunted an agreement. Privately, he thought that it was worth it, but that wasn't something that he wanted to share just yet. Shawn hadn't earned it. "Hit me again, and I'll hit you back," he said and took Shawn by the arm, leading him to the bedroom without much resistance. "Leave me tonight for anything short of a fire breaking out, and I'll take away your library card."

"Now you're just being really, really mean. Not to mention, twenty years too late. I got banned for life for reorganizing the books in the children's department by color one rainy afternoon. I think they're still looking for _The Bobbsey Twins in Rainbow Valley_."

"Is that so."

Carlton kicked the bedroom door closed and ended their journey at the bed. He was tired, exhausted even, and he'd eaten too much popcorn. He wanted to use Shawn as a pillow and sleep, no more than that, but even to his eyes Shawn was a twitchy, jittering emotional wreck. Carlton didn't feel responsible, not really. Shawn was the one who'd seduced him, used him, left him, and punched him all in less than forty-eight hours. The only point in Shawn's defense was that apparently he hadn't been able to resist Carlton's charms any longer and couldn't help himself. Or something like that. Which made him unique since everyone else in the world appeared to have no trouble doing that at all.

Either way, when you started to feed a stray kitten, you couldn't stop, not if you wanted to be able to look in the mirror without seeing someone ugly.

"Spanking or blow job, Spencer. Pick one," he said gruffly.

Shawn's eyebrows rose along with the hem of his T-shirt as he wriggled out of it. "Pick _one_? Are you insane? Did I knock some brain cells loose when I hit you?"

"I'm tired," Carlton said, taking off his robe. Ungrateful brat. "Take it or leave it."

Shawn gave him a calculating look that he smoothed out into a reasonable, let's be adults here, smile when Carlton growled at him warningly. "How about I get the spanking and you get the blow job?"

Carlton sighed, sat down on the bed, and hauled Shawn down and across his knee. It took a small amount of adjusting to get Shawn settled, but overall, the maneuver went smoothly. Most things did when Shawn was cooperating. "You won't like this as much as you think you will, you know," he said, echoing his earlier words.

A spanking. That was done to hurt. What the hell Shawn hoped to get out of it was beyond Carlton, but he could do one better than the girlfriend and deliver something that deserved the name -- until Shawn stopped him and began to complain vociferously, that was. Carlton made a bet with himself that Shawn wouldn't take more than five slaps before bailing.

"Yes, Sister Lassie."

"You're going to hell," Carlton said with conviction, and pulled Shawn's shorts down to mid-thigh. Something told him that Shawn would need to save him a seat, because the sight of his handprint, faintly pink, on Shawn's ass a moment later had him achingly hard. It wasn't that he enjoyed hurting Shawn, it was the simple fact that Shawn was letting him do this and the way that Shawn tensed then relaxed with a sigh, his ass lifting up a fraction of an inch, asking for more. Carlton obliged with a second slap, holding nothing back, shocked with his reaction but too aroused to stop until Shawn told him to.

"God, that hurt," Shawn said after a high-pitched yelp. "What happened to warming up and starting slowly?"

"I didn't say anything about that and shut up unless you want me to stop," Carlton told him, running his hand possessively over all that pale, unmarked flesh. "In which case, a simple, 'Carlton, please stop' will do nicely."

"Yeah, I'm not going to say that," Shawn told him.

Carlton paused, mid-spank, which left him feeling on edge. "Then we stop right here, right now." Limits. He had to set some.

"Then I start calling you Sarah after she who once was nameless but I guess that's out of the window now."

Carlton pinched a patch of pink skin between two fingers. That didn't count as going back on his word and it was vaguely soothing to be doing something beyond staring. Shawn's ass, in this position especially, cried out to be touched. He'd fucked it, driven his fingers and his cock deep inside Shawn's hot, hungry hole, but that was yesterday and this was now. "You want this, Shawn. And I…don't mind delivering, but we do this properly and that means you do as you're told when you're ass up over my fucking knee, are we clear on that?"

"Sir, yes, sir," Shawn said smartly. "Spank me some more."

"When you tell me what it takes to get me to stop."

"Lassiebear, stop making me squeal like a piggie?" Shawn wondered.

Carlton brought his hand down, the lightest spank imaginable, and heard Shawn hiss with frustration. He wanted to add his own dissatisfied grunt, but he held it back. "Nope."

"Master of Pain, please have mercy?"

"Shawn, I'm waiting to paddle your ass as red as a hand can get it, but waiting is all I'm going to do until you behave." Shawn's hands were out of sight near the carpet, but Carlton heard a muffled thud as if Shawn had hit out. Temper, temper. "Say it and you get what you want. Keep me waiting much longer and we move on to my blow job."

"You want to do it," Shawn argued. "If it gets too much, I'll just tell you, Lassie. Stop being a pedantipuss."

"Stop fighting me and say it my way." Carlton was prepared to be inexorable, immovable. It was for Shawn's own good. He ran his hand through Shawn's hair, gripping it roughly, moving Shawn's head from side to side. "Just say it," he murmured, hearing how raw his voice sounded. "Say it and I start, Shawn."

"You're telling me to do it," Shawn said. "Why not try asking me?"

"I already did," Carlton said, refusing to get trapped inside Shawn's maze. Before he knew it, he'd be the one begging and that just wasn't going to happen. "You gave me some back-talk I'm going to remember very clearly when I bring my hand down on your ass, but --"

"Carlton, please stop."

"What?"

"That's what you want me to say," Shawn said. "I said it. I didn't mean it. Get on with this before I start making clucking noises."

"I wouldn't," Carlton said. "I won't do it if I'm pissed off, remember."

Before Shawn could reply -- which meant his hand began to move while he was still speaking -- he gave Shawn the third slap and kept it hard but not full-strength. Shawn turned his head and their eyes met for a long moment.

"You know what to say," Carlton said, speaking quietly into the dense hush around them. "Until then, eyes down, mouth shut, and…enjoy it."

Carlton didn't really expect Shawn to do the first two, but Shawn surprised him.

He made it to the point where Carlton's hand was flinching away from each blow, his palm sore and hot, until he gasped out the three words Carlton had been waiting to hear. By then, Shawn's endurance was less of a surprise. Carlton wasn't sure that Shawn was getting what he'd expected from the spanking, but Shawn was sure as hell getting something. Shawn's back was glistening under a coat of sweat, desperate, incredulous sounds accompanying each slap, but he was hard as a rock, the damp tip of his cock brushing Carlton's thigh and leaving it streaked. His shorts had ended up on the floor at some point, but Carlton couldn't remember it happening.

When Carlton drew back his hand with a heartfelt, "Son of a _bitch_ " as he shook it in an attempt to cool it down, Shawn went limp and heavy. Recalled to his responsibilities, Carlton ran his hand down Shawn's spine, stopping short of the scarlet ass and thighs. "Okay, it's over," he said, his voice sounding strange. He'd been making some noise himself during the spanking, but it hadn't really been talking. His eyes stung. Not as much as his hand, but still. "You did good."

He wasn't sure what qualified as well-behaved when someone was getting spanked, but Shawn had done what he was told and that was enough to make some positive reinforcement due.

Shawn didn't answer and Carlton sighed and carried on awkwardly stroking Shawn's hair and back with his left hand, his right hand cupped loosely at his side. Comforting words didn't come easily to him, but he did his best.

"You said them. Good for you. I didn't think you would. I was hoping you would, because quite frankly, my hand hurts like hell, but I figured if you could take it I could. I hope that wasn't why you kept going, Spencer. That kind of macho posturing is just -- well, this isn't the time or the place for it. Next time, not that there has to be a next time, don't think I'm saying there does, because there doesn't, I think we should go into it with a number in mind. I tried counting, but I uh, lost count around --"

"Fifty-four," Shawn said and squirmed off Carlton's knee and onto the bed, all without letting Carlton see more of his face than a red cheek, suspiciously damp. "Yeah, maybe we should. I don't know."

"Do you want me to --" Carlton trailed off mid-question. They might have both been hard, but sex was the last thing he wanted right then, which made no sense, but what about any of this did?

He got off the bed, patting Shawn's calf reassuringly, and went to the bathroom. Before he ran his hand under the cold water, he took off his shorts and wrapped his fingers around his cock, the heat soaking into his skin. It felt too good for him to be entirely comfortable doing it. Jacking off with the hand he'd just used to…

He realized his hand wasn't just holding his dick and snatched it away, thrusting it under the water. It helped a little, but his palm still felt tender, still looked swollen.

With a cold, wet washcloth in his hand, he went back to the bed. "You might want to bite down on a pillow for this."

"Huh? What --" The sound that ripped out of Shawn when the cloth was draped across his ass verged on unearthly. Carlton was reminded of cats battling it out in the moonlight. He put his hand on top of the wet cloth and held Shawn down.

"Stay still. It'll help."

"Now it hurts!" Shawn bellowed at full volume. "Don't ever try and help me again!"

"I will if you will."

"That's different," Shawn snarled. "You need my psychic visions."

"And you need this," Carlton told him and flipped the cloth over, drawing a violent shudder from Shawn, but thankfully a silent one. He had neighbors to consider, after all. "Let me take care of you."

Shawn sighed and turned his head. "You're a man of surprises, Carlton. I expected you to freak out over this and you didn't."

Carlton shrugged. "You wanted something. That's not new. You want a lot of things, Shawn."

"Don't always get them."

"If I'm one of them, I've got news for you, you do. Have." Carlton grimaced and took the cloth away. It was practically steaming. "Let me rinse this out again."

"Leave it." Shawn nodded back over his shoulder. "I can't see all of it, but it looks…wow."

Carlton ran his finger over a particularly vivid splash of color. "Too much," he grumbled. "You should have stopped me."

"Why didn't _you_ stop?"

"I was going to, but…"

"Enjoying it too much?"

Carlton was long past blushing. "Enjoying it, yes, but I'd gone past that. I wanted to stop. My hand hurt and you were -- I could see what I was doing to you."

"But you didn't stop." Shawn's eyes saw too much. Always had.

"You needed it. How the hell could I?" Carlton cleared his throat. "You're an idiot, Spencer, but I trusted you to know when to say three simple words."

"I love you."

"Not those three."

"But, Lassie, I _do_ ," Shawn said with a perfectly straight face. "You're third on the list after Gus and pineapple."

Carlton turned Shawn to his back, ignoring Shawn's completely genuine whimper of agony, and wrapped his red, stinging, hurting hand around what was left of Shawn's erection, pinning him down with the other.

"Pineapples have flowers, did you know that?" he said conversationally.

"If I say I did will you move your hand? Up and then down again, and don't be afraid to speed up."

"Lavender, light purple, red…kind of like your ass right now."

"Astonishing coincidence."

"Isn't it?" Carlton squeezed his hand and smiled when Shawn said "Lassie…" imploringly.

"Some get pollinated by bats in the wild," he continued, trying to remember the details he'd read online after the third time Shawn had left a beribboned pineapple on his desk. He'd assumed it meant something rude, but apparently there was no deep significance to the gift of a pineapple beyond 'welcome' to anyone but Spencer and since it was his desk and Spencer was the guest, that didn't work.

"Bats!" Shawn said, his voice skidding higher when Carlton relented and began to jack him slowly. "I like bats."

Carlton let go. "Enough to put them above me on the list?" He didn't mind fitting in behind Guster, but he was damned if he was worth less to Shawn than an _Ananas comosus_.

"How about I make a new list of people I'm dating and put you right at the top with a lot of blank space underneath and absolutely no need to write P.T.O. at the bottom?"

Carlton lay down next to Shawn and tugged Shawn onto his side. He could still jerk Shawn off like this, but it would ease the chafing on his well-spanked ass.

"I want that list on my desk first thing tomorrow," he said, not meaning it, his attention on the way Shawn's cock slid through his hand, the flushed red crown appearing and disappearing. Mesmerizing.

Shawn's eyes gleamed. "Oh, it will be. In triplicate. In fact, I'll make lots of copies for everyone."

Fuck.

"Spencer…"

"Or you can cuff me to your bed, where I can't get up to anything naughty without you being able to deal with it on the spot with a firm hand, and take the day off," Shawn said with a nibble at Carlton's ear lobe. "That's going to work much better than putting an 'out of order' notice on the copier."

"Don't tempt me," Carlton growled and went back to what he was doing. "And if you go near the copier, I'll shoot it," he added, but Shawn had stopped listening to him.

Carlton could always tell when that happened.


End file.
